


A Meeting in the Woods

by DarkMasterofCupcakes



Series: Glimbow Prompts [1]
Category: She-Ra and the Princesses of Power (2018)
Genre: Based on a headcanon I had, But I like it or I'm keeping it, Childhood Friends, Crash into Hello, F/M, First Meetings, For Glimbow Week 2020, Gen, Idea came from before Noelle revealed how they met, Little Bow, Little Glimmer, Teleportation Accidents, teleporting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-26
Updated: 2020-02-26
Packaged: 2021-02-27 21:54:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,494
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22912798
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DarkMasterofCupcakes/pseuds/DarkMasterofCupcakes
Summary: After being unfairly punished, Glimmer decides to explore in the Whispering Woods, and ends up meeting the boy who would become her lifelong best friend.
Relationships: Bow & Glimmer (She-Ra), Bow/Glimmer (She-Ra)
Series: Glimbow Prompts [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1646905
Comments: 11
Kudos: 40





	A Meeting in the Woods

Glimmer sat in a chair in the corner of her room, pouting as she thought about the unfairness of her current situation. She had been sent to her room early for not listening to her mother, and not for the first time that week. 

It wasn’t even like she had even been doing anything all that bad. All she had been trying to do was get a snack. 

Sure, maybe she should have asked if she could have one, instead of trying to teleport up to the shelf to grab the jar full of freshly baked cookies that were kept on the high shelf in the kitchen. But she had known that she would have been told no if she had bothered to ask; her mom would have said that it was too close to dinner, even though it was more than an hour before they were supposed to eat, and Glimmer was already hungry. 

So she had decided to get herself a snack. It wasn’t her fault that her powers hadn’t worked right and she accidentally broke the cookie jar…and the shelf the jar was on…and a bunch of glasses. It was an accident! 

She shouldn’t have gotten in so much trouble for something that she didn’t even mean to do; her mom should have just scolded her or something, not sent her to her room before it was even dark outside. 

Glimmer listened carefully to see if she could hear anyone coming towards her room. When she didn’t hear anything, she climbed out of the chair and scurried over to the neat little cushioned bench thing next to her bedroom window, looking outside and into the woods that were just behind Bright Moon’s castle. 

She had gone in there once, with a couple of guards, but that had been a while ago, and they hadn’t gone too far in. 

Glimmer had remembered thinking the woods were pretty cool, and had wanted to explore more, but the guards had refused to go any further into them, and they wouldn’t let her go in alone, so she’d had to settle for what she’d gotten that day. 

Now that she was being unfairly punished, she thought even more about how unfair it had been that she’d been unable to have as much fun as she wanted that day, all because the guards were too scared to go a bit further into the woods; and that made her even more angry than she already was. 

And then she realized something: she could go exploring in the woods if she really wanted to. She wasn’t scared of going into the woods, even if the guards were; not even if she was all by herself. And if she needed to get back home quick, she could just use her magic and teleport. 

Yeah, maybe her teleporting didn’t always work super great, but this was different from trying to get the cookies before – she didn’t have to be so perfect with where she went this time, so it wouldn’t matter too much if she messed up just a little. 

Besides, her getting to have some fun exploring inside of the woods would kind of make up for the fact that she was being so unfairly punished right now. 

Glimmer took a second more to think about whether or not she really wanted to do this, and then nodded to herself once she’d made up her mind; she was definitely going to go explore the woods, and she was going to do it all by herself. 

She closed her eyes and thought hard about where she wanted to go…and suddenly she was inside of the woods, looking up at her bedroom window. 

Glimmer took a second to see if anyone had heard her teleporting, and if they would come to try and bring her back to her room, but if anybody heard or noticed her gone, they didn’t come. She took a second to quietly cheer for herself, briefly clapping her hands together, before darting off into the deeper woods. 

For what felt like hours, Glimmer explored inside of the woods, going further then she had ever gone before, hopping off small ledges and crawling under some roots as she made her way deeper and deeper into the trees. 

The further she went in, the darker it got, but she wasn’t scared. In fact, the darkness made her even more excited; it made her feel like she really was exploring someplace entirely new, not just wandering around in the woods behind her home. It made her feel like a grown-up. 

She was still thinking about that when she heard a sound coming from a little deeper in the woods, just outside her line of sight. 

At first she wasn’t sure what it was, but when she took a few steps closer and listened again, she realized that the sound had been a voice; someone else was in the woods with her. 

“Who –“ Glimmer stopped herself before saying anything else. 

Maybe it wasn’t a good idea to just start yelling out loud like that in the middle of the woods, she considered as she heard the voice again. 

Not that she was scared or anything like that, because she really wasn’t; but maybe there were animals sleeping or something, and she didn’t want to wake them up by screaming. Her mother always got upset when Glimmer woke her up when she was trying to sleep, and the young princess had a feeling the animals in the woods behind her home wouldn’t like being disturbed any more than her mother did. 

So, instead of yelling, she decided to get closer, taking careful steps towards the direction of the sound, her shoes barely making any noise on the grass as she slowly walked closer and closer. The more steps she took, the louder the sound of the voice got. It also got a lot clearer, and as she started to approach a small clearing in the woods, she heard whoever it was cry out a little and realized something: it wasn’t a grown-up that she was hearing; it was another kid. 

Now she was even more curious to see who they were, because she didn’t really know too many other children that lived around Bright Moon. Whoever was making the noise, they must have been new, or maybe they lived somewhere else and were just playing around and exploring the woods, just like her. 

Either way, now she knew she had to meet them. Glimmer continued to walk, going faster now that she knew she was going to be seeing another child and therefore really had nothing to even possibly be afraid of. Not that she would have been scared even if it was a grown-up, of course; but she would have been a little more careful so she wouldn’t disturb them and upset them. 

After a few more seconds, she had made it to the clearing and was finally able to see exactly who was making the noise that had brought her over in the first place. Standing in the middle of the clearing was a boy with dark skin and dark curly hair who looked like he was about her age, or pretty close to it since while she could tell he was bigger than her, it wasn’t by that much. 

He was holding a small bow in one hand and was trying to, somewhat clumsily, put what looked like an arrow into it with the other. Both the bow and arrow looked like they were handmade, but whoever made them had done a very good job. 

At least, Glimmer thought they did; she didn’t really see a lot of bows and arrows at Bright Moon, since none of her family’s guards really used them. 

She watched as the boy fired off the arrow he’d been loading. It landed pretty far, even if it didn’t exactly go straight. It was still very impressive, if you asked Glimmer. 

As she watched the boy walk over to where the arrow had landed, she made a very important decision: she decided to actually go over and introduce herself to him. At first, she thought about just walking over to him…but then she realized that she had a better, and much faster, way of getting over to say hello. 

Closing her eyes, Glimmer did her best to focus on where the boy was, and thinking about being next to him. A second later, she felt herself vanish from where she had been standing, and suddenly reappear close to where she had remembered the boy being…but not exactly where she had wanted to be. 

She had wanted to teleport next to him…and instead found herself in the air just above him, where she quickly found herself crashing down on top of him, the two of them each letting out a cry as she landed. 

Glimmer rolled off the boy, whimpering softly as she rubbed where she’d fallen; she already knew she was going to have a bruise, and was not looking forward to telling her mom about how she got it. 

“Are you okay?” Glimmer looked up at the sound of another child’s voice beside her, confused for half a second before she remembered what she had been doing, and saw the boy kneeling on the ground beside her. 

He was also rubbing his shoulder a little, so she figured that must have been what she’d landed on; she hadn’t really had time to think about where exactly she was falling when it happened, after all. But, that wasn’t really the biggest thing to worry about right now. The fact that he was actually speaking to her was a much bigger concern, and she had to think of something to say. 

“Why are you asking me?” she asked, saying the first thing that came to mind. “I’m the one that landed on you – _I’m_ supposed to ask if _you’re_ okay.” 

The boy made a thoughtful noise and seemed to consider what Glimmer had just said. “I think I’m okay,” he finally said after a few more seconds of thought. 

He got to his feet and held out his hand, offering to help her up. “My name’s Bow. What’s yours?” 

Glimmer hesitated briefly, her hand hovering in the air inches away from his. She knew she was technically supposed to talk to strangers like this – her mom always told her not to – but Bow wasn’t a stranger; he was just another kid, and he’d just introduced himself so that meant he was double not a stranger. 

“I’m Glimmer,” she replied, taking hold of his hand and using it to help her get back on her feet. 

Bow looked at her for a few seconds, seeming to pay particular attention to her hair. She was starting to feel a little funny about him staring when he finally spoke. 

“Did you get your name because of your hair?” he asked, pointing at the pink and purple locks. When she made a confused little noise in response, he clarified by adding, “Cause your hair is really sparkly, and that’s what glimmer means, right? It means sparkly?” 

Glimmer ran her fingers through her hair, thinking about what he’d just said. She had never actually thought too much about why she had her name; she just had it, and that was all she really thought she ever needed to know. But, she supposed what he had just said did make sense…

”Maybe” she answered with a shrug. She then decided to ask him a question of her own, thinking that if he got to ask her one, then it was only fair that she got to do the same. 

“Did you make that?” Glimmer questioned, pointing to the small wooden bow that the boy was still holding onto, even as they were talking. 

Bow just nodded in response, though it seemed like the question had made him remember something, as he suddenly seemed to be looking for something, squinting his eyes in what seemed to be an attempt to help him see better. 

It took a moment before Glimmer realized what he was looking for – the arrow that he’d shot earlier. Apparently he had lost it after it fired…which might have happened when she’d landed on him, now that she thought back to a few moments ago. 

She started to feel kind of bad, especially when he started walking around, clearly trying hard to find what he had lost; after all, it was kind of her fault that he couldn’t find it. The least she could do was help him look for his lost arrow, she thought to herself as she started to look around the clearing herself. 

She looked up at one of the trees, and saw something stuck in the trunk, just a bit higher than she thought they could reach, even if she tried standing on his shoulders to get a boost. Then again, he probably couldn’t have held her up, anyway, so it wouldn’t have even been worth trying. 

Still, she knew she had to at least try to get the arrow back for him. 

“I think I see it,” she called out to get his attention. When Bow turned to look at her, she pointed up at the place in the trunk where the arrow was stuck. “See? It’s right up there, with the pointy end in the tree.” 

Bow looked up at where she was pointing, using his hand to keep the sun out of his eyes as he looked up. When he saw where she was pointing, he visibly deflated, letting out a defeated sigh as his shoulders slumped. 

“I can’t believe it got stuck like that,” he muttered, obviously speaking to himself and not to Glimmer. “Now I gotta try and get it back down…” 

He walked over to the trunk of the tree, and seemed to be trying to work up the nerve to actually start climbing. Or maybe he was just trying to figure out where to start, since even the lowest branch was still quite a bit above his head, and the trunk was pretty thick; probably too big around for a boy that young to really grab onto very well, especially well enough to climb up very far. 

“I can get it for you,” Glimmer offered, running over to where Bow was still trying to figure out how to get into the tree. 

He looked over at her, appearing grateful but somewhat confused and surprised at the same time. 

“Are you good at climbing?” he asked, stepping away from the tree and walking over to her. Glimmer shook her head. 

“Not really,” she admitted. “But I can just teleport up there to get it, if you want me to.” 

“What do you mean you can teleport up there?” Bow asked. He sounded a little confused and very excited, like he wasn’t sure if he believed what he was hearing, but was hoping it was true. 

“I’ll show you,” Glimmer cheerfully said. Before Bow could say anything else, the young princess suddenly vanished from where she had been standing, only to reappear a moment later, perched in a branch near where the arrow was stuck. 

She still had to stretch to reach the arrow; it was a bit farther away than she had thought it looked. Her fingers wrapped around the shaft of the arrow and she tugged, hard, hoping to dislodge it. It worked, but only after she had pulled very hard – hard enough that the force she used caused her to jerk back slightly, and lose her footing on the branch she’d been balancing on. 

She thought she heard Bow call her name as she started to fall, but she couldn’t be sure. Instinct had taken over almost as soon as she felt her feet leave the branch and she quickly activated her powers in order to teleport somewhere much safer. 

Thankfully, it worked, with her only experiencing a small bump as she found herself landing on the ground after reappearing a few inches above it. 

The sound of footsteps against the ground were followed almost immediately by Bow’s voice asking, “Are you okay? You’re not hurt, are you?” 

She was a little sore from landing on the ground, but otherwise she was fine, so Glimmer smiled at Bow and shook her head to answer the second question. She also told him that she was fine, just in case the silent answer wasn’t clear enough. Then she held up the arrow that was still grasped in her hand and held it out so Bow could take it. 

He smiled brightly and took it from her; then he pulled her up from the ground and suddenly wrapped his arms tightly around her, giving her a hug. 

Glimmer was a little surprised by the act, but in a good way. She recovered quickly from the surprise and soon enough found herself returning the embrace, squeezing him back just as tightly as he had hugged her.

It took about two minutes before either of them seemed to realize that what they were doing might have been seen as a little strange; after all, they had only just met a few minutes ago, and some people might have thought it was unusual to be hugging someone you only just met – even if the other person was a child like yourself. They pulled away, basically at the same time. 

“I…I think I need to go home,” Bow said, looking and sounding regretful to say the words. “It’s getting late.” 

It did seem to be getting darker, Glimmer noticed now that the detail had been brought to her attention. She hadn’t realized it until then, because the woods were already fairly dark because of the leaves above their heads blocking out the light from the sun. But now she was well aware that night was starting to fall. The sound of an owl hooting somewhere in the nearby trees served as a way to confirm this fact. 

She probably should be heading home herself, Glimmer realized; even if nobody had checked to see if she was still in her room by now, she was sure they’d be looking soon. And if she wasn’t there when her mom or the guards came to check on her, she knew she’d be in even more trouble than she already was. 

However, she didn’t want to say goodbye to Bow. She had only just met him, but she already knew that she really liked this boy; he was really nice and he seemed like he’d be a lot of fun to play around with. 

But, if they went their separate ways right now, who knew if they would ever actually get to see each other again, especially when Glimmer had no idea if Bow lived anywhere nearby, or if he was just visiting around Bright Moon for the day. 

The fear began to bubble up inside of her, until it finally broke the surface in the form of a somewhat anxious question: “Do you think we could see each other again, soon?” 

Bow was silent for a second or two, blinking and looking a little confused by the question. 

“Of course,” he said, causing Glimmer to feel absolutely full of relief. “Friends spend a lot of time together….and we’re friends now, aren’t we?” 

By now, Glimmer was practically beaming as she nodded her head to answer his question. She had been starting to wonder if she could call Bow her friend, considering they had only just met, and now here he was, showing a very clear desire to do just that. Obviously she was going to take him up on the offer. 

“Yeah, we’re definitely friends – best friends,” she proclaimed excitedly. That might have been a bit of a stretch, but she saw Bow smile as she said it, and knew that he was more than fine with how she was labeling their new friendship. 

“Guess I’ll see you tomorrow, then?” Glimmer questioned, unable to keep herself from sounding hopeful. “Maybe I could even show you where I live, if you want.” 

Bow nodded, looking genuinely excited at the offer that had just been extended his way. He held out his hand, sticking out his pinky finger and waiting for the princess to react. She immediately stuck out her own pinky, giving a grin as she linked it with his, silently making the promise to see each other the following day. 

They let go of each other’s hands, and Bow said a final goodbye before running off into the woods, leaving Glimmer alone, but happy as she turned around and started to make her way back to Bright Moon. 

As she walked, she couldn’t help but think about how, just maybe, it was worth being punished, considering that was the whole reason she’d gotten to meet her new best friend.


End file.
